A little revisionist history…

I just remembered that we had set up a contest for you guys to predict what would happen in the final six games of the season. The comments were pretty funny and there were those who thought I was being optimistic, picking the Dodgers to win four of six to get to the playoffs.

Turns out, I wasn’t optimistic enough. The winner of that contest was dhofs@earthlink.net, who correctly predicted the Dodgers going 6-0 and the Padres going 4-2. He also had the Phillies going 6-0 and the Dodgers winning the tie breaker to "limp into the playoffs." He was right on most accounts, except for the Phillies, so he gets the set of four baseline seats to a 2007 game.

So here’s another chance to earn some more of those prime seats. Pick the winner of both League Championship Series and the World Series, as well as how many games it’ll take each team to win. You’ve got until the end of the day on Thursday for your guesses, which gives people a little time to see how it starts, but the bold ones will put their predictions before they can see how it starts.

Todays LA Times, http://www.latimes.com/sports/la-sp-plaschke11oct11,1,5943067.column?coll=la-headlines-sports, says not to resign Nomar. Once again I don’t think Mr. Plaschke really uses his head for thinking. Yes Nomar will ask for 3 years and yes he will ask for 7-8 million per year. But I’ll bet he’ll accept 3 years worth of heavy incentives to get it , so the money isn’t the real problem. The real problem is making room for Loney, which I agree with. What Mr. Plaschke is so short sighted about is the fact that Nomar can and has played all of the infield positions and willing to do anything for the good of the team. And the last time I saw we really do need a strong 3B. Nomar hit 303, 93 RBI’s, 505 SLG, 356 OBP etc… All of this in 122 games. More then any stat can prove, he was a leader of veterens and rookies. Can the Dodgers really afford to lose such a valuable asset ?? This guy is willing to sacrfice for the sake of the team and you don’t find that in the free agent market. Nomar is a true Dodger and needs to be retained now !!
Go Dodgers !!! Go Nomar !!!

I’m late in getting this in so I won’t comment on the ALCS. I’m a lowly Dodgers fan living in St. Louis and have had many Cardinal NLCS’s to watch. LaRussa is not a playoff manager. He usually finds a way to manage a very talented ball club out of the playoffs. Dodgers have not necessarily benefited from this in the past, but it does/will happen.

Hey garysmith – I have rarely found credibility in what Bill Plaschke has to say. I recall him painstakingly going out of his way to insist that the 2002 Angels didn’t have a prayer in the post-season. It seems that he is always “laying in wait” to pounce on the Dodgers when things are not going well for them (but then, I guess we all do, to some degree). I have found that he is wrong far more often than he is right, which makes him a perfect fit for the L.A. Times.

That being said, I fear that Plaschke is correct in his assessment (this time) regarding Nomar. I simply do not see Colletti being willing to offer Nomar anything but an incentive laden one-year deal, nor do I see Normar being willing to accept anything less than a three-year deal. For these reasons, I believe that Nomar has played his final game in a Dodger uniform.

On the brighter side, I look for great things out of James Loney next season, including 15 to 20 homeruns (or more).

Hey 53 good to hear from you. I still think Nomar is good for the Dodgers. Becasue he can play almost anywhere I think he offers a lot more versatility then Lofton does. He could be moved to RF and Drew to CF and we save the 93 RBI etc… When there’s a will there’s a way !!! Time will tell who’s right.

I agree with you big time Gary. Heck, I wouldn’t mind seeing Nomar as our everyday third baseman. I just don’t think that the Dodgers are willing to give him a multi-year deal. I sincerely hope that I am wrong about this, but I don’t think that I am (this time).

I think that any team that goes 71-91 last year, should have be given the vote here
(say thats’ the dodgers record last year) so here I go.

alcs detroit in 5

nlcs cards in 6

w.s detroit in 6

as far as normar goes, I say re-sign him, if he is willing to sign a two year deal loaded with incentives, and maybe becoming a super sub. knowing that loney should be at first and betemit at third with la roche waiting at l.v.

normar could play first , ss, 3 rd, can’t see why he couldn’t fill in at second or left field. this guy plays at 150%.

keeping people like him and Maddux around only adds great players, and leadership to what could be a great young team, with some older players who need rest,( kent)

pitching will still be the key next year, and if gagne, and brazoban can come back, and we get rid of our middle guys this year, we should be okay.

with the yankees already out of it,you know that they will pay big bucks for any good pitching (zito)

also so sad to here about cory liddle, pray for his family.

next question for Josh, 2 parts

1) what dodgers who played in L.A. this year still qualify

for roy for next year, and what minor league players do we have to protect in the up coming rule 5 draft.this will affect our 40 man roster as well as some of our current players. thanks so much for this blog

PS- Nomar was fun to watch but he wants to play more than we should let him. Him and Drew are ******* pansies.***** Dipodesta. At any rate, forget Nomar, lets spend that ~8 million in our rotation somewhere. We need somebody who can throw some ******* heat. How in the world does Detriot end up with three kids throwing 100 mph!!!?? I’ll never know. They sure are fun to watch though. We need another starter and somemore bullpen arms. Tomko, Sele, Hendrickson!!! With those names in our bullpen was anyone expecting to beat the Mets??? I know I dreamed about it Friday night before that playoff game. Forget Soriano. Forget Zito. Foget A-Rod. Aramis Ramirez sounds appealing.

If Nomar will play third….(he should be willing to, for the team), sign him to one yr. plus an option.
Then sign Soriano, and the order is set…. just need a number 1-2 starter. (how about Japan’s Mat….ka ?

josh, thanks for the blog. been a great resource and a place to hide from the world around us.

would love to see the dodgers go after soriano. would add power to the outfield, and potentially serve as successor to kent at 2b if he makes the move back. not sure what to do with garciaparra — certainly can act as supersub utility, but not sure he’d want that role just to stay home in socal.

kemp didn’t look ready at the end of the year, and unless he has a great winter, seems destined to spend a bit more time in AAA. drew’s contract has a couple more years on it, meaning he can be let go to make room for the kids in the OF, or be traded in the future down the stretch if we’re out of the race the next couple of years.

doubt arod gets moved.

how’s this for a lineup? young and talented.

S Furcal – SS.

L Loney – 1b

R Soriano – LF. 6y, 90m?

L Drew – RF

R Kent – 2b

L/R/R Ethier/Repko/Kemp – CF

R Martin – C

S Betemit – 3b

Pitcher

lowe

schmidt — 2 years, 10 mill?

penny

kuo

billingsly

hendrickson in the pen and a starter sub. would love to see zito, but prefer power pitchers…

On the Nomar note, I don’t really see him coming back to LA. Sorry, guys but I just don’t see it happening. Sure, he managed to stay relatively healthy for most of the season, but the injuries he dealt with toward the end of the season should have sidelined him earlier. In effect, they kind of did. Yeah, he hit a couple of clutch home runs but for the most part he was too hurt to be effective offensively. Loney @ 1st in ’07, need power and better defense from 3rd base (I think Betemit can be a 30 – 35 HR guy, but he needs to work on the right side batting), Kent/Furcal up the middle. Yeah, Furcal’s defense sufffered toward the beginning of the year, but we all know that he had offseason surgery and didn’t ge the same prep for the season that he usually has.
My lineup:

SS – Furcal

CF – Repko

1B – Loney

2B – Kent (or the aforementioned power hitting 3B)

RF – Drew

LF – Ethier

C – Martin

3B – Betemit

See, the problem here is that we have too many great #2 or #3 guys and no real 4 or 5 guy. Offseason move – get someone to hit 30+ HR w/ 120+ RBI. Either he plays LF or 3B, but Nomar’s not him. If Penny can lose 20-30 pounds and build up some stamina, keep him. I love what Penny did at the beginning of the season, but by the end of the all-star break he just looked tired all the time. I also feel like he just tried to pitch around people to much. He’d get an 0-2 count and then throw 3 straight balls. I realize that he’s just trying to get them to swing at something unhittable, but it makes the pitch counts get too high too fast. Stop trying to strike them out, just get outs faster. That’s my take.

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